the Pathway to Excellence

What is the Pathway to Excellence programme?

On the Pathway to Excellence programme you will discover how to use the power of sports psychology to change the way you perform. You will learn to use and adapt your natural thinking styles and your habits to build the skills and attitudes that are essential for success in sport.

Who’s it for?

The programme can be used by anyone at any stage in their sporting life from juniors to elite performers because the key skills can be applied at every level.

What will I learn on the programme?

The programme has 6 key elements that cover the most important aspects of performance sports psychology. Each element works well on its own but when applied with the other elements they become truly transformational.

Here’s a brief overview of what you will cover on the programme:

Become a goal-getter not a goal-setter…

Goals are the building blocks of success in sport. They are vital for long-term vision and short-term motivation. Goals provide a focus for your energy, a way of measuring performance and success and allow you to see progress where otherwise you may not.

Although we all set ourselves goals, very few of us actually set goals effectively and we therefore set ourselves up for failure. The secret to success is in the way we set our goals because the way we do it is as important as the goal itself.

In this part of the course you will learn to form goals so that you can achieve them time after time.

Mind your language!..

The way we talk to ourselves has a great impact on how we perform. We need to be aware of the way we talk about our abilities, performances and opportunities (out loud and through our internal dialogue) so that we have it working for us rather than against us.

By changing how you use your choice of language, you can make very positive changes in your ability to perform. During this part of the course you will learn ways of using language effectively to achieve this.

See it, believe it, achieve it…

Mental rehearsal (sometimes known as visualisation) is a vital element to improving not only the mental aspects of performance but also the physical aspects too. Champions have won a competition many times in their heads before the event even started. They saw themselves doing exactly what they need to do to win; they heard the sounds involved and felt the feelings so that by the time the event came around they are confident of success.

Mental rehearsal can be used for a wide range of situations including controlling nerves, increasing motivation and confidence, learning from past performances, practicing skills and becoming familiar with new surroundings. Positive thinking on its own is often not enough to achieve success unless you know the key steps to make it work for you. In this section you will learn the keys steps to make mental rehearsal really work for you.

Choose your emotion…

The ability to control ourselves and get into a positive emotional state is extremely advantageous. The mind and the body are part of the same system so one will always have an impact on the other. So whether you’re feeling anxious or relaxed, confident or defeated your body will respond accordingly.

Here you will discover ways of controlling the way you think and the way you feel to enable optimum performance.

Build your master plan…

From a very early age we learn ways of doing almost everything that we have to do in life and riding is no different. For some people these ‘ways’ are strategies, carefully thought through and planned, for others they are habits that can have good or bad results and for some they are “just the way I am”, a series of unconscious choices that result in success or failure.

For example, we have strategies for learning something new, strategies for ways for dealing with stress, strategies for practice and for getting fit. The reason why it is important to know about strategies in sport is because they can be the difference between success and failure.

The greatest sportspeople are successful because they are using the most successful strategies. In this section you will learn how to design your own strategies that really work for you.

Become your biggest fan…

You can look at any situation from different perspectives and get a very different view of events. One person’s embarrassing failure is another person’s heroic near-success. Being able to see things from a positive perspective has a very powerful impact on our motivation, enthusiasm and self-belief.

Having the skill to put a positive perspective on what happens during a performance without losing sight of actual performance is a major benefit. Learning to change the way you experience a poor performance or a difficult situation is a very powerful ally in making the necessary improvements to put it right in the future. By learning to expand your perception you can learn to handle negative situations in a much more resourceful way. In this part of the programme you will learn how to reframe events to create a positive, empowering perspective.

How do you run the programme?

We deliver the programme in three ways:

There’s the intensive programme where we run it over five consecutive days. As the name suggests, it’s intensive but it’s fast-paced and very focused.

The bitesize programme where it is broken down into six 1-day sessions with a good break in-between sessions to allow you to practise and apply each element.

The tailored programme where we run it for individuals or teams to fit it in around their season’s schedule and other obligations. The personal approach that gives you the sort of support that suits your needs.

How do I book onto the programme?

You can do the programme individually or as part of a mixed group. The intensive and bitesize sessions run at specific times during the year and individuals can book their sessions at any time subject to available appointments. To find out dates and book yourself onto the programme simply call us on 01284 799 355 or email us, we’d love to hear from you!

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We run sports psychology workshops at our training centre in Bury St. Edmunds. For more information call the office on 01284 799 355.